“It’s Iran. It’s always nuclear,” grumbles Rona-Lee Shimon — the Israeli model and actress from Fauda, now inhabiting the role of a clandestine Mossad agent — in The Terminal List: Dark Wolf, David DiGilio’s latest Amazon Prime spy thriller. Set against the fraught backdrop of the Obama-era Iran nuclear deal in 2015, the series wastes no time establishing its grim worldview.
The prologue features a reckless exchange: an ISIS commander swapped for hostages on a truss bridge. American operatives stand alongside their Iraqi Security Force trainees, staring down their Islamic terrorist adversaries. It speaks to DiGilio’s directing dexterity that he can make you feel the atmospheric tension and portent as if you were there: from hostages suddenly hesitating to the militants shouting in Arabic and firing warning shots — it all makes the ambush feel inevitable, but no less gripping.
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From there, the story follows Ben Edwards (Taylor Kitsch) and Raife Hastings (Tom Hopper), former Navy SEALs disillusioned with bureaucracy and its endless layers of approval. Convinced that due process only keeps terrorists alive, they are seduced into the morally ambiguous, often romanticized world of CIA black ops under handler Jed Haverford (Robert Wisdom). Framed as a prequel to The Terminal List (2022), the series shifts focus from Chris Pratt’s James Reece to Edwards’s descent from decorated soldier to Rambo-esque mercenary-for-hire.
Where Dark Wolf excels is in its action craft. Shootouts are staged with nerve-racking precision. Edwards, Hastings, and their fellow CIA operators move with the fluidity of soldiers who’ve drilled this choreography a thousand times — reloading, flanking, and clearing cover with chilling efficiency. Their weapons seem less like tools than extensions of their instinct. Such technical realism, paired with the taut editing, keeps the show firmly grounded.
Threaded through the military spectacle is the show’s central tension. Unshackled from the SEALs’ formalities, Edwards operates under the intoxicating illusion of freedom: no chain of command, no interagency vetting, only a single “deep source” in Tehran — a figure known as the Shepherd. When whispers of uranium enrichment reach Haverford, the team deploys instantly. No questions asked, no cross-checking. Hastings voices caution, but Edwards, giddy at his newfound license, charges ahead, blind to the glaring red flags.
Edwards and Hastings strike an engaging balance: Edwards, the charismatic hothead, Hastings, the measured tactician. Their chemistry gives weight to the moral tug-of-war at the center of the show. Hastings (often futilely) preaches patience, but Edwards has seemingly waited his entire career to be unchained from any rules of engagement.
The supporting cast adds texture, particularly Israeli actress Shiraz Tzarfati as Tal Varon, another Mossad operative whose ingenuity saves her from a brute three times her size in one of the show’s cleverer fight sequences. It’s always revealing how action screenplays cast women in combat. Dark Wolf avoids the pitfall of turning them into superheroes, instead grounding their survival in skill and resourcefulness.
Although Tehran’s nuclear ambitions drive the plot, Haverford’s makeshift troupe brims with ulterior motives that keep the story unpredictable. Eliza, played with slippery charm, insists to Edwards, “I am not hiding anything from you.” Convenient words, given she had shot him in the back and left him unconscious in a tunnel only an episode earlier.
There is much to enjoy in Dark Wolf. DiGilio highlights the foibles of black ops while refusing to sanitize either the Iranian regime or the severity of its nuclear aspirations. One early scene has Edwards rallying Iraqi fighters with a pep talk about reclaiming their country from ISIS. American foreign policy has absorbed its share of criticisms, but the series insists that liberty and freedom remain its most valuable exports.
Harry Khachatrian (@Harry1T6) is a film critic for the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is a software engineer, holds a master’s degree from the University of Toronto, and writes about wine at BetweenBottles.com.